Comments at Arlington County Board Meeting, January 21, 2023.
This is a belated annual political yard sign report to County Board. Out of 750 “Clement” signs deployed throughout the county before the election, 70 percent or over 525 were confiscated from the medians by November 12, the Saturday after the election.
On that day one volunteer reported that he drove the length of George Mason Drive and recovered exactly one “Clement” sign. A sign recovery operation I conducted in North Arlington later that day revealed that most of the medians had been wiped clean.
The obvious suspect is the Arlington County Democratic Committee, its volunteers, and/or operatives, since sign confiscation was county-wide, and my signs were gone where the ACDC had removed theirs. This is clearly illegal but not to worry. ACDC enjoys solid support among the voters, many of whom approve unauthorized sign removal as long as the targets aren’t Democrats. One of them even opined in NextDoor as follows:
“Taking signs that you posted in a public right of way is not a crime. These signs were not on your personal property. I’m sure this will come as a shock, but someone removing signs you posted on a public right of way is every bit as much an exercise of their freedom of speech as placing them was of yours.”
Presumably enforcement of the state criminal code as it pertains to sign removal applies only to non-Democrats and non-profit advocacy groups like Arlingtonians for Our Sustainable Future (ASF) to whom the message above was directed.
Welcome to the People’s Republic of Arlington where the law is what ACDC says it is.